Quest. LXII. Is the trial, judgment, or consent of the laity necessary to the admittance of a member into the universal or particular church?

Answ. 1. It is the pastor’s office to bear and exercise the keys of Christ’s church; therefore by office he is to receive those that come in; and consequently to be the trier and judge of their fitness.

2. It belongeth to the same office which is to baptize, to judge who is to be baptized; otherwise ministers should not be rational judges of their own actions, but the executioners of other men’s judgment. It is more the judging who is to be baptized, which the minister’s office consisteth in, than in the bare doing of the outward act of baptizing.

3. He that must be the ordinary judge in church admissions, is supposed to have both ability and leisure to make him fit; and authority and obligation to do the work.

4. The ordinary body of the laity have none of all these four qualifications, much less all. 1. They are not ordinarily able, so to examine a man’s faith and resolution with judgment and skill, as may neither tend to the wrong of himself nor of the church; for it is great skill that is required thereunto. 2. They have not ordinarily leisure from their proper callings and labours, to wait on such a work as it must be waited on, especially in populous places. 3. They are not therefore obliged to do that which they cannot be supposed to have ability or leisure for. 4. And where they have not the other three, they can have no authority to do it.

5. It is therefore as great a crime for the laity to usurp the pastor’s office in this matter, as in preaching, baptizing, or other parts of it.

6. And though pride often blind men (both people and pastors) so as to make them overlook the burden and look only at the authority and honour; yet is it indeed an intolerable injury to the laity, if any would lay such a burden on them which they cannot bear, and consequently, would make them responsible for the omissions or misdoing of it, to Christ their Judge.

7. There is not so much as any fair pretence for the laity having power to judge who shall be received into the universal church; for who of the laity should have this power? Not all, nor the major vote of the church; for who ever sought the votes of all the christians in the world, before he baptized a man? Not any one particular church or persons above the rest; for they have no right to show for it, more than the rest.

8. It is not in the power of the laity to keep a man out of their own particular church communion, whom the pastor receiveth; because, as is said, it is his office to judge and bear the keys.

9. Therefore, if it be ill done, and an unworthy person be admitted, the consciences of the people need not accuse themselves of it, or be disturbed, because it is none of their employment.

10. Yet the liberty of the church or people, must be distinguished from their governing power, and their executing duty, from the power of judging. And so, 1. The people are to be guided by the pastors as volunteers, and not by violence: and therefore it is the pastor’s duty, in all doubtful cases, to give the people all necessary satisfaction, by giving them the reasons of his doings, that they may understandingly and quietly obey and submit. 2. And in case the people discern any notable appearance of danger, by introducing heretics and grossly impious men to corrupt the church, and by subverting the order of Christ, they may go to their pastors to desire satisfaction in the case. 3. And if by open proof or notoriety it be certain, that by ignorance, fraud, or negligence, the pastors thus corrupt the church, the people may seek their due remedy from other pastors and magistrates. 4. And they may protest their own dissent from such proceedings. 5. And in case of extremity, may cast off heretical, and impious, and intolerable pastors, and commit their souls to the conduct of fitter men; as the churches did against the Arian bishops, and as Cyprian declareth it his people’s duty to do; as is aforesaid.

John xx. 21-23; xxi. 15-17; Matt. xxviii. 19, 20; 1 Cor. iv. 1, 21; Tim. v. 17; Heb. xiii. 7, 17; 1 Cor. v. 3-6, 11; 2 Thess. iii. 6, 10, 14; Tit. iii. 10; 2 John; Mark xiii. 9, 23, 33; Mark iv. 24; Matt, vii. 15, 16; xvi. 6, 11, 12; Mark xii. 38; viii. 15; Phil. ii. 2, 3; Col. ii. 8; 1 Pet. iii. 17; Matt. xxiv. 4.